Help

iCyte is a web research management tool that lets you save and annotate entire webpages. Much better than bookmarks,
it lets you highlight the most useful text directly on the saved webpage, tag, search, comment, and securely
share your saved content with others.

Instructions for how to use the basic iCyte functionality have been included in our tutorial.

Does iCyte have an API?

Yes, a RESTful interface is available so you can develop your own programs to access your data within iCyte. The documentation is available at www.icyte.com/api/docs/

What are plugins and Add-ons?

Plugins (sometimes called add-ons) are programs that add a specific function or tool to a web-browser. They are generally quick to install and take up very little space on your hard drive. Because they function within the web browser, the icons for add-ons are generally located within the browser or the browser menu bar.

Plugins can be managed through the web browser. In Firefox, choose Tools->Add-ons from the menu. Firefox will automatically check for any updates.

Can I use iCyte on someone else’s computer?

As long as the iCyte plugin is installed on that computer. You need to make sure you sign in with your own username (email address) and password. Go to www.icyte.com and click on ‘sign in.’

What is the "Dashboard" page?

The "Dashboard" page is what you see when you sign in. On the dashboard, you can see recent Cytes that have been made in projects that you're a member of, along with quick links to projects that have had recent activity. From here you can go to your ‘Cytes’ page where you can see all your projects, or to the ‘Settings’ page, where you can change your profile and manage your projects.

What is the "Cytes" page?

This page shows you all of the Cytes in projects that you've been assigned to, and lets you filter them by project, tag, or author. You can also enter a search string to filter your Cytes to only those that contain your search.

From the "Cytes" page you can navigate to the saved version of the Cyted page or return to the original webpage. Each Cyte also displays the name of the person who created the Cyte and the name of the project.

Click on the "Edit", "Copy" or "Share" links within each Cyte to perform an action on a Cyte. The Share action allows you to share the Cyte with social network websites (such as Twitter and Facebook), send your Cyte in an email, or generate an embed code to allow you to embed the Cyte on a blog, wiki or other website. The Edit action allows you to edit the title, project, tags or note associated with a Cyte, and also allows you to delete a Cyte. The Copy action allows you to copy the Cyte (including the tags, note, and saved webpage) into another project.

The "Cytes" page allows you to sort your Cytes by title, project, owner, tags or creation date. The cog button at the top of the Cyte display performs an action across all of the Cytes that are currently displayed, and allows you to export the list of Cytes to Word (RTF) or Excel (CSV), email, or copy all of the displayed Cytes into another project.

What is the "Settings" page?

The "Settings" page is where you can manage your profile, email notification settings, and update your billing details.

What is a User Profile?

This is a description of you. Details can include your location, professional and personal interests. You can add a link to your webpage, a description about yourself and even a photo. What you add to your profile is entirely up to you, so add as little or as much as you like.

Who can see my User Profile?

Unless you contribute to a public project, your profile will only be seen by other users in the projects you belong to.

Do I have to log into iCyte to copy pages or mark text?

You do not have to, but if you want to keep a record of it in iCyte you have to be logged into iCyte.

When you create a Cyte, you will be prompted to sign in. However the iCyte button will appear in the browser regardless of whether or not you have signed in.

How do I view the Cytes I've made in my projects?

You can quickly access the Cytes you've made by clicking the iCyte sidebar button in your browser's toolbar.

What is a Cyte?

Cyte is our word for a webpage you have saved and added tags or notes to. The various Cytes are normally allocated by you to a project, where websites relating to the same topic are kept together.

What are Tags?

Tags are the way we categorize information so that it can be searched more easily.

For example, if you were to create a project for home renovations, and saved, say, 30 webpages, there would be a number of tags that would help to sort and organize your research. For instance your list of tags for the various pages might include; plumbers, electricians, flooring specialists, soft furnishings, designers etc. The idea is to create a list of tags that is going to best support you in classifying your research information, so that you can quickly review pages dealing only with plumbers, etc.

Tags are added to Cytes in the create Cyte box. Just type in the word. Remember - tags are case-sensitive, they can consist of more than one word, and are separated by a comma. When adding a tag used previously, a pull down list will appear once you type the first letter. Select the suggested tag to add it.

For large and more complex projects, getting the tag list right is really important. It is worth taking the time to think about the tags you might want to use. If you are working with a group, it is useful to share your suggested tag list with each other. This will help different users to apply tags in a way that is consistent, and will make later retrieval of information much more effective.

Tags for Cytes can be changed, deleted or added to after the Cyte has been created. On the Cytes page, find the Cyte you wish to edit, click the cog icon, and select the ‘change’ option. This will allow you to edit the tag list or make changes to the notes.

What are notes?

Adding notes to a Cyte is a way of making a comment, either for your own later reference, or for others in your project. It’s really just a way of adding more information.

What is a project?

Projects allow you to categorize your research into different areas of interest. For example, you might have a project to manage all the information for your home building project called ‘Home Renovations’, and a separate project for researching holiday destinations called ‘Holidays’.

You can create as many projects as you like, and you can invite other people to join your projects. Other people can invite you to join their projects.

You can also ask to join public projects. To do this you need to click on the project name, and then click on the project owner’s name. Send them a message to ask if you can join their project.

What is the difference between a private project and a public project?

Public projects are projects that can be viewed by anyone and are a great way of sharing your research with the world.

Although you can view the Cytes for a public project, you cannot contribute to the project until you become of member of that project. To do that you will need to send a message to the project owner. If the project owner wants you to contribute to their project, they will add you to the project by clicking on the 'edit' link on the project landing page.

Private Projects can only be viewed by members of the project. By default, all projects are initially private.

What does it mean if the iCyte button is grey/disabled?

Some webpages take a while to finish loading. The iCyte button remains grey until the page has loaded. Once it returns to a solid color (blue or black) you can begin making Cytes.

What do the images mean?

The question mark indicates there is information or a tip. Place the mouse or cursor over the question mark and a box will pop up with extra information to help you.

What cookie settings are required in my browser to create a Cyte?

Firefox browser add-on Users

If you're using the iCyte browser add-on and have version 2.1.0.48 or above installed, you only need
to have 'Accept cookies from sites' enabled in Firefox
to create a Cyte. If you can successfully login to the iCyte website, you should be able to create a Cyte.

Firefox bookmarklet Users

Firefox doesn't allow us to read and write cookies for the www.icyte.com domain from our plugin dialog
unless it's configured to accept third-party cookies. You can rectify this by doing the following:

Open the Firefox preference dialog

on windows: select 'options' from the 'tools' menu

on mac: select 'preferences' from the 'Firefox' menu

on linux: select 'preferences' from the 'edit' menu

On the Firefox preferences dialog, click on the 'Privacy' section

Check the 'Accept third-party cookies' checkbox.

What changes are planned for future iCyte releases?

The features planned for future iCyte releases are driven largely by user demand, so if there's something you'd like to see added to iCyte please let us know.

Can I share my Cytes with other websites (twitter, facebook, etc)?

Any public Cyte or project can be shared with other websites. The list of websites that you can share with includes twitter, facebook, digg, stumbleupon, technorati and more. View our video or tutorial page to see how to do this.

How do I give another user access to my iCyte project?

From the "Cytes" page, click on the name of the project you want to edit in the project list, then click on the edit link. On the "edit" dialog, enter the e-mail addresses of the users you'd like to have access to this project in the collaborate text field. You can separate multiple e-mail addresses with commas.

Is it possible to embed a Cyte or project into my website, blog or wiki?

Any Cyte or project can be embedded into an external website. View our video on how to do this.

The iCyte icon doesn't appear in my browser toolbar. How can I fix this?

Internet Explorer

Before you see the iCyte toolbar icon in Internet Explorer you must install the iCyte plugin. Follow the instructions in our help documentation to install our plugin.

If you've installed the iCyte browser plugin and don't see it in your toolbar, go to the view -> toolbars menu in Internet Explorer. You should see an 'iCyte' menu item. If the item is unchecked click on it to check it. If the item was already checked, try unchecking it and then checking it again.

Firefox

Before you see the iCyte toolbar icon in Firefox you must install our browser add-on. Follow the instructions in our help documentation to install our plugin.

If you've installed the iCyte browser plugin and don't see an iCyte icon in your toolbar, go to the View menu in Firefox and select Toolbars -> Customize. Then drag the iCyte icon from the customize toolbar dialog up into your firefox toolbar.

How do I install iCyte on a second computer?

If you've already installed iCyte on one computer and want to use your existing account on another machine, navigate to the iCyte download page and click the "download" link.

After installing iCyte on your second computer, login to www.icyte.com using your existing iCyte account.

How do I make a private project public?

From the "Cytes" page, click on the name of the project you want to edit in the project filter box

Click on the "edit" link in the green box on the project landing screen

On the "edit" dialog, check the "Make this project public" checkbox, then click "update"

Is it possible to Cyte Word documents or Excel spreadsheets using iCyte?

You cannot directly Cyte a Word or Excel document, however you can if you first save the file in HTML format and open it in your web browser. Steps for doing this in Microsoft Word are:

From the file menu in Microsoft Word, select Save as HTML (or Save As webpage)

Click Yes or Save on the dialog box that appears

Open your web browser

From the file menu in your web browser, select open and browse to the file you saved

Click ok or open to view the file

Create a Cyte

Is it possible to create a Cyte in a pop-up dialog?

Yes, this is possible from the iCyte browser add-on (but not with the iCyte bookmarklet). If you right click your mouse anywhere in the pop-up dialog (except on a link) you can select the 'iCyte' menu item to create a Cyte.

In Internet Explorer, part of the Create Cyte dialog is cut off. How can I fix this?

If you find that part of the Create Cyte dialog is hidden off screen, you'll need to change the zoom level
in Internet Explorer back to 100%. To do this, open Internet Explorer and go to the View menu, select 'zoom', then '100%'.

How do I move a Cyte to another project?

On either the Cytes page or in the iCyte browser sidebar,
click on the "edit" link to the right of the webpage thumbnail. Select the project you want to move the Cyte into,
then press the "save" button.

How do I delete a Cyte?

On either the Cytes page or in the iCyte browser sidebar,
click on the edit link to the right of the webpage thumbnail. On the Edit Cyte dialog, click on the "delete" link, then press "delete" to confirm to delete the Cyte.

When trying to create a Cyte with the bookmarklet on some websites, I get an error that I cannot Cyte this type of document. Why is this?

The iCyte bookmarklet allows you to Cyte all documents you can view in your web browser, with a few exceptions.
Non-HTML contents, with the exception of Adobe PDF files, cannot be Cyted. Also webpages that don't contain a
frame that is large enough to display our create cyte dialog in cannot be Cyted. Unfortunately these technical
limitations cannot be overcome from within a bookmarklet.

How do I uninstall iCyte?

Internet Explorer

Access the "Add or Remove Programs" screen in Windows; this is typically accessed
by going to the start menu, selecting "Control Panel", then "Add or Remove Programs".
From the add/remove programs window, click on iCyte, then click "Remove".

Firefox

From the Tools menu in Firefox, select "Add-ons". On the Add-ons dialog box, click on
the "extensions" tab, locate the entry for iCyte and press "Uninstall".

How do I Cyte a PDF file?

Any PDF file that can be displayed by your browser can be Cyted with iCyte. To Cyte a PDF, your browser must be set to display PDF files in-line. See our FAQ entry for instructions on doing this.

Navigate to a PDF file that you'd like to Cyte, then click the "Create Cyte" button in your browser. iCyte will then save the PDF file, and redirect you to the saved PDF. On the saved PDF file, optionally highlight some text, then press the "Create Cyte" button again to Cyte the PDF. After doing this, the PDF will be displayed on the "Cytes" page, alongside any HTML webpages that you have Cyted.

How do I setup my browser to display PDFs inline?

Windows Users

All major browsers on Windows will display PDFs inline by default as long as you install Adobe Reader after installing your browser.

Mac Users

Google Chrome

If Chrome is not already displaying PDFs inline, visit the URL: chrome://plugins/, and click the enable link next to the "Chrome PDF Viewer" extension.

Firefox

Currently Mozilla Firefox is the only web browser that supports making multiple selections
on a webpage simultaneously. Firefox users can create a Cyte that contains multiple highlights
but making multiple selections on a webpage then pressing the "Create Cyte" button
in their browser. To make multiple selections in Firefox, highlight a portion of the
webpage as usual, then hold down the command key (or the control in Windows) and make another selection.

Go to the Cytes page. Select the project you want to backup.
Click on Backup. This process can take a few hours depending on our server load and other backup jobs in the queue.
You will be notified by email when your backup has ben completed.